Wraith (23 page)

"Sorry if I yelled at you," I apologized. "I
was just startled, I guess."

The intensity of his gaze was unnerving.

I grabbed the raft and stepped a few feet out into
the water. "Are we going to do this thing, or not?" I blurted, my
heart beating fast. "I believe I was promised fish?"

His eyes stayed on me as he came to my side.
"And fish you shall see. Stay right here a minute. Don't go any
deeper."

Like
that
was a possibility!

He disappeared in another blur, and from time to
time I could see him underwater, poking around the convoluted ridges of coral
and lava rock that protruded from the sea floor, making wandering around the
cove all but impossible for anyone without water shoes.

The sun remained in hiding, and I dropped down to a
squat to put more of myself in the water, which at the moment felt considerably
warmer than the air. When standing, the ocean came to just above my knees, so I
wasn't
too
nervous.

When Zane reappeared at my side again, he was
smiling. "You're going to love this. Follow me."

I picked my way over the uneven surface, wary of the
shifting currents and bizarre difference in temperature between
indistinguishable streams. I had never been in the ocean before—not even to
knee high—before a couple nights ago. Surprisingly, I wasn't as afraid now as I
thought I would be.

"What you do," Zane instructed, stopping
near a stand of twisted lava spires that just breached the surface, "is
put the board on the surface of the water, right around here." He pointed.
"Then lower yourself enough to look through the window."

The lapping water pitched suddenly against the
breaching spire of lava, sending up a blip of water that splashed onto my
waist. I hesitated.

"Kali," Zane prompted gently, "Trust
me. It'll be worth it."

His voice radiated with something so warm and
beguiling that a flush of heat sprang from my toes and flooded clear to the
roots of my hair. My eyes were drawn involuntarily to his—but I could look at
him for only a second. It was all I could stand without launching myself
through empty space in a hopeless quest to touch him.

The sun reappeared at last, and as the air began to
warm I gathered my nerve and dropped down onto the water—my feet and knees
drifting on the ocean floor while my upper body rested on the raft. I stared
into the plastic window.

My breath caught.

There really
were
fish here. And not just one
or two dull gray ones, either. Dozens of brightly colored, curiously shaped
ocean fish milled around the twists and turns of lava, nibbling at the equally
colorful spreads of plant life that clung to the rock's chaotic contours.
Things that looked like anemones shot out their eerie looking tentacles to sway
in the currents, while more hesitant fish poked their noses out of a honeycomb
of tiny lava caves, ready to retreat at the first sign of danger. It was not an
aquarium. It was not a movie. All these awesome creatures were real, they were
living, and their watery home went on and on… stretching far beyond me and this
cove… clear to the ends of the earth.

It was totally, freakin',
amazing
.

I found myself slowly moving, turning and
reorienting the board toward other interesting things I saw in the distance. It
was as if an entirely new world was unfolding before me—a world I had
previously been blind to. When at last I heard Zane's voice, it took me by
surprise. I had no idea how long I had scooted and stepped and splashed around,
eager to get closer to the main stands of lava rock on the west side of the
cove, which housed even more fish. It was tough going without scratching myself
on the coral, but I was managing so far.

"Careful, Kali," he warned. "You're
not paying attention to the depth."

I stood up sharply, and realized that I was standing
in water to mid-thigh. A couple more steps in the direction I was headed, and I
would be up to my waist.

"Crap!" I exclaimed, splashing back into
safer territory. "Why didn't you warn me?"

"I did!" he protested, chuckling.
"I'm glad you're getting comfortable."

I looked back toward the beach, which was
considerably farther away than I would have guessed. But I was okay. The water
was just above my knees, and though there were deeper pits here and there, I
could see exactly where I was stepping. 

"Oh, wow," Zane said suddenly, looking off
toward the resort. "You're going to love this."

He led me a few steps away into water that was no
deeper, but considerably harder to maneuver through because of thicker lava
formations. "You don't need the board," he instructed. "Just
look."

My gaze followed the direction he was pointing to
see a familiar smooth, dark shape gliding serenely just beneath the surface.

"A sea turtle!" I exclaimed. "A giant
sea turtle!"

The creature, which gleamed greenish yellow in the
sun, was hardly a giant of its species, sporting a shell about a foot and a
half long. But to me, seeing it swim around in the wild waters of the ocean
while I was standing right there next to it was too cool for words. 

"Have you ever seen one before?" Zane
asked.

I shook my head. "Only in zoo aquariums. I
can’t believe there's one right here in this cove—with all these people
around!"

"I've seen turtles here before," he
remarked matter-of-factly. "But not usually this time of day. There are
even more in Kawela Bay."

We stood a long time, watching the turtle tool
around in the gentle current, unconcernedly exploring the curls and caverns of
lava rock. Zane, of course, could get as close to it as he wanted, but although
the turtle didn't seem to mind my presence in the general area, whenever I got
within a few feet, it would flipper slowly away. 

"That's far enough," Zane warned again as,
transfixed by the turtle's hypnotic, gliding movement, I found myself
unthinkingly following it. "The water gets deeper that way."

I stopped in my tracks. I had been paying no
attention whatsoever, which was so unlike me, it was absurd. Yet here I was—doing
something I had never before in my life had the nerve to try. I threw Zane a
sheepish look. Maybe he was right. Maybe, given enough time, he really could
teach me to swim.

If we had time.

I turned back to the turtle.

It had disappeared.

The sun moved behind a cloud again, and I gazed
upward to note its position. It was afternoon already. Where had the day gone?

My parents were due back by five o'clock, after
which we were all going to Matt's house for dinner. He was excited about it;
that was why he had texted me. I thought it would be fun, too. But I had hoped
to accomplish something first. Something a lot more important than my seeing a
giant sea turtle.

"Let's go in," I said to Zane, feigning a
cheerfulness I didn't feel. "You've accomplished your goal—I no longer
fear the ocean. At least, not all of it. But it's getting kind of cold."

Standing up in the water with wet skin and no sun, I
had no trouble producing another shiver. But I wasn't really cold this time.

Just worried.

A half hour later I was back in dry clothes, being
led by Zane on a scenic tour of the rest of the resort grounds. We walked
around the shore of Turtle Bay proper and then out onto a narrow land spit that
hosted a curious concrete block structure.

"It's a bunker, from World War II," Zane
explained, answering my unspoken question as I examined the tiny square
building, which was laid half-in, half-out of the sand. It had a solid roof and
open doorway in the back, while inside two open windows were strategically
placed to offer views of the ocean North and West. The inside was dank and
cool, but the concrete roof was doing a nice job of catching the fickle
sunshine, and I climbed up on it and sat down.

Zane stood a few feet away, watching me curiously.

"What?" I asked.

His brow furrowed. "Don't you see anything
here? I mean, like shadows?"

I glanced around. I hadn't felt anything. As for
what I saw, I had successfully blocked it out as it happened—a feat that was
easy when I was preoccupied. "There's a man and a little boy, playing,"
I answered. "The usual amount of fainter Polynesian shadows… they're
always around. A woman is  taking a picture a couple of feet away from
you—camera's huge, probably something from the seventies. That's about it,
right here. Why?"

He blinked at me. "You see all that?"

I nodded.

"But you don't see anything… military?"

I was puzzled for a moment, but then understood.
"Oh. You mean because of the bunker. You thought I would see history
reenacted?"

He let out a breath. "I guess so, yes. That's…
kind of why I wanted to walk this way."

"Disappointed?" I teased. "I told
you, the ability is worthless. I don't see things I want to see, or the kind of
things historians think are important. It's more about the shadows
themselves—their emotions. Every time I think I have it figured out, I see a
shadow that doesn't fit. But for the most part, I think that what I'm seeing
are moments that were turning points for people—what they would remember most
about their lives."

Zane came and sat next to me on the bunker roof.
"It
is
a gift, Kali," he insisted, "even if you can't
always see the value in it. I wish you would realize that."

My lips twisted. "Look, you got me out in the
ocean today, didn't you? That's a pretty big accomplishment in the Kali
improvement program. Don’t even try to make me happy I see dead people. You're
good, but lightning isn't going to strike twice. Give it up."

He grinned. "I'll never give up."

I swallowed. For the hundredth time, I found myself
biting back something I wanted to say. Something about how much I looked
forward to his teaching me to swim—or, what the heck?—to surf. Something about
how incredibly fun and exhilarating this day, and every other day I had spent
with him, had been. About how often my subconscious mind turned to thoughts of
doing other fun things with him—biking, hiking, taking a flight across the
Pacific, exploring Cheyenne, meeting my friends, taking up ballroom dancing and
performing a ridiculously sexy salsa routine at prom. I wanted to take walks,
sip cool drinks, cuddle up on a couch and watch a movie, play cards, write
stories, go out to dinner, pack a picnic lunch, have a fight and make up, take
a road trip…

We would never do any of it.

"Zane," I said heavily. "I don't know
how much time I have left here. For all I know, my parents are deciding on a
house right now. I want to help you out of this… this limbo that you're in. But
you have to cooperate. No more distractions. And absolutely no more putting me
and my stupid issues first—no matter how much I like it and how pathetically
easy it is to get me off point. Okay?"

Zane laid back flat on the bunker, both his face and
voice expressionless. "Okay. Thanks. What do you want me to do?"

Hold me.

"I want you to finish telling me everything
you've remembered about yourself." I answered. "Starting where you
left off before. When your mother lost her job. What happened next? How old
were you?"

It took a moment for him to answer. "I was
midway through high school," he said in a monotone, the solidness of his
chest wavering again, "when I realized my mother was a drug addict."

"Your mother started taking drugs?" I
asked, my voice thin. "What kind of drugs?"

He shrugged. "I'm not sure what she started
with. But she ended up on heroin. And there were pills, too. At the end, she
wasn't particularly picky."

I swallowed. I had no idea what to say. Maybe I
didn't need to say anything. For once, he seemed willing to share without
prompting.

"My mother was a really wonderful person,"
he said quietly. "And I loved her. But even as a kid, I could tell she
wasn't strong. She was talented and successful and charming, but she never had
any real confidence in herself."

Zane looked away from me, seemingly embarrassed.
"My mother was the kind of woman who
had
to have a man around.
Always. She could manage her own finances, cook her own meals, raise a child…
she was perfectly capable of doing everything any other single person had to
do. But she couldn't stand being alone. She needed the constant attention, the
adoration, the ego boosting. She needed to feel like she was part of a couple,
be seen as part of a couple. Having a man around was as crucial to her as
having heat and electricity."

He squelched a sigh, then continued.

"When she was successful, she dated successful
men, and they more or less treated her well, until they got tired of her. And
they all got tired of her. They got tired because they were prescreened to be
operators who feared commitment and craved variety. The kind of man who was
looking
for a long-term relationship was never the kind of man she was attracted to.
Don't ask me why, because I don't know. I never could figure it out. When I got
old enough to see what was happening I used to do a little matchmaking. You
know… my widowed biology teacher, the engineer two floors down. Honest, solid
guys who I thought would respect her.

"She was never interested. She wanted Antonio
from the club, Richard the indicted broker, Ryan the anchorman. And, at the
end, Devon, the unemployed playwright-cum-pusher. When her self-esteem suffered
from being out of work, her standards in men sunk even lower. She used to be
reasonably careful about who she brought home, how long they stayed, and
whether or not I was comfortable with them being there. But once she started
using, she didn't care about anything anymore except making herself feel
good."